Nem Wan:Free Range Deranged: Well, why not? Their country, their rules. You don't want to keep the faith? Then leave the country.

Afghanistan voted for the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights which prohibits religious discrimination.

The US votes for UN crap all the time and we still do as we please. In this case, as I understand it, the Afghan Constitution does not discuss conversion from Islam, so the judge has to follow Islamic law.

Zamboro:Many who consider themselves tolerant, ordinary Christians nonetheless react very badly when their beliefs are called into question, especially when it is done so in a clear and convincing manner.

Yes, many do. And many who consider themselves reasonable act unreasonably. But I'm not sure what your point is.

Zamboro:Many who consider themselves tolerant, ordinary Christians nonetheless react very badly when their beliefs are called into question, especially when it is done so in a clear and convincing manner.

How do you or the rest of us know that isnt sarcasm? It really appears to be that way, especially with one of the guys saying farkin.

Personally, I call bull on the tv station video aspect of the article. The only times I've seen any country not name which specific tv network showed a video that caused them to act on something is when they couldn't find a video. Chances are they heard a rumor that turned out to be correct, and said some western men were videoed.

Personally, I was always an extremely tolerant person but now I realize that one can't be tolerant of intolerance. It is simply unsafe to let people be who are happy to hang you because you like different sex positions or whatever.

Fundamentalism (the idea that you have the right to tell others how to live their lives) is the biggest evil of our time.

Fundamentalism is really popular though, so it must resonate with something in human psyche. My guess is that fundamentalism is so popular because it feels good to be "tough" even if that toughness is really self-righteous meaness. I'm not particularly religious, but I have to say that Jesus was superior in his whole "turn the other cheek" idea because breaking cycles of violence are key to a better world.

Anyway, to all fundamentalists -- God gave everyone the right to sin. Judgement for sinning is between God and each person individually. Humans laws are only for society (people affecting other people), but are not appropriate for anything that is personal belief, orientation, private action. Furthermore, if you are worried about having sinners around you, then you are weak and are a sinner yourself. Any hardness in your heart is a sin. Any satisfaction in someone being punished is a sin. The only thing you should feel for someone who may (in your opinion) be sinning is pity. Any anger, outrage, hate, etc. means you're the one going to Hell.

way south:Zamboro: It's so tragically, pointlessly brutal. They have no concept of how meaningless it is to kill or die for either religion.

Its got nothing to do with religion.They just want you to think that way so you bang your head against our concept of freedom of religion instead of realizing its all about power and how they usurp it from the rightful authorities.

By making everyone a fearful member of faction X they allow a cleric three nations away to call the shots for people he couldn't give two craps about otherwise.Wont matter how many taliban we kill or how many times a day we drive through a town liberating people. This judge is putting the cold hard pinch of an outside power directly on them and its being perceived as having the blessing of the state.

If we keep treating such men as religious leaders instead of enemy conspirators, we're not going to make any progress.

Oh, I agree...somewhat.

Who are these " rightful authorities."

By making everyone a fearful member of faction X they allow a cleric three nations away to call the shots for people he couldn't give two craps about otherwise.

Is your objection to the cleric or the fact that (he/she) is three nations away?

Finally, Its got nothing to do with religion

I disagree. Religion has nothing to do with God or ANY seekers goal. Religion is the sport of the powerful.

I will hold my tongue until.....

Remember though, I am Bedou, I can outlast you here in this dry digital wasteland.

It may well be feedback problem; regular practice using (or deactivating) your brain in a particular fashion trains it and makes it easier. OTOH, the trait complex seems to have a non-trivial inborn component. (Which, if it's inborn and non-genetic, would be interesting but not immediately pertinent.)

Certainly not enough. There might be some impact in directing the tendency to less harmful targets than might otherwise happen that might have some benefits at a group-selection level, but that's about it.

Fuller:The best that can be said about it is that it gets in the way of progress. The worst - it creates problems that wouldn't otherwise exist

The best that can be said is it may be creating those problems as a trade-off for reducing even larger problems that otherwise would exist, possibly such as focusing the problem in ways that might be less harmful than otherwise. Which merely says that it could be better than collapse to a purely Hobbesian state. To (hah) give the devil his narrow due, though religion is possibly a mere biological or sociological spandrel, it has been around too long and is too universal in humanity for me to readily credit it being a purely net detrimental trait. Contrariwise, that there ought to be less detrimental alternatives seems plausible.

Zamboro:What I'd bet my last dime on, though, is that a child who grows up in an environment where the notion that faith is virtuous will wind up with diminished capacity for critical thought, at least when it comes to the claims they've been coached to have faith in.

Also plausible; as I suggest above, brains get trained to thought patterns.

The question, then, is how best to grow such capacity in an environment pre-saturated with authoritarian submission and figures/ideas considered immune to criticism.

neenerist:Don't be too hasty now, how many would it take? I'm guessing clerics like this are driven by the knowledge they're untouchable.

The problem is that if its done by a individuals perceived as outgroup, there will be a backlash against the outgroup by the entire society. (Even if we tried keeping it covert, it wouldn't be long before we were getting the blame anyway.) This would escalate the US-Afghan conflict further, and possibly draw in other Muslim states as allies, potentially escalating to a large enough faction to draw in Russia or China - against the US.

Perhaps it makes me a lousy person, but I'd prefer to let the Afghans stay barbarians for a while longer than risk a serious global confrontation... for the moment. Lower risk and more gradual approaches seem more advantageous.

Mind you, if we could figure out how to pick out the worst apples before they became prominent, I wouldn't object to pruning. However, once they're prominent more covert means are ineffective, and since the CIA isn't even able to reliably predict when riots are going to break out the idea of predicting who's going to be a leader in another 10 years is laughable.

Islam is like Christianity, anyone who advocates anything violent has never read their own holy book.

Are you being sarcastic or something?

They attacked Midian just as the LORD had commanded Moses, and they killed all the men. All five of the Midianite kings - Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba - died in the battle. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword. Then the Israelite army captured the Midianite women and children and seized their cattle and flocks and all their wealth as plunder. They burned all the towns and villages where the Midianites had lived. After they had gathered the plunder and captives, both people and animals, they brought them all to Moses and Eleazar the priest, and to the whole community of Israel, which was camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho.

Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the people went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the military commanders who had returned from the battle. "Why have you let all the women live?" he demanded. "These are the very ones who followed Balaam's advice and caused the people of Israel to rebel against the LORD at Mount Peor. They are the ones who caused the plague to strike the LORD's people. Now kill all the boys and all the women who have slept with a man. Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves.

ciberido:"Yes, many do. And many who consider themselves reasonable act unreasonably."

In what sense? If you were to correct me like that I'd thank you for strengthening my understanding of reality.

ciberido:"But I'm not sure what your point is."

That there's an element of instability in even western, moderate believers because they have that soft, unprotected underbelly we sometimes poke even without meaning to. When your identity and sense of meaning come from a set of beliefs that aren't tenable and that can be pointed out within the span of a sentence, it makes you an emotional landmine that can be set off with just those few words.

jabelar:Fundamentalism (the idea that you have the right to tell others how to live their lives) is the biggest evil of our time.

I agree, but my concern is that virtually any worldview (even atheism) can spawn that kind of fundamentalism. Have you ever visited a former Soviet republic, or country that was once a Soviet satellite? I have nothing against communism per se, but some of the atrocities that were done in the name of communism are just as bad as any honor killing or auto de fé.

I have stood in the ruins of ancient monasteries and temples which were demolished in the name of rationalism. No ideology, no matter how rational its foundation, is immune to this kind of perversion, which is why I say we need to be on guard against extremism in any form, and not lay the blame for everything at the feet of religion.

This is NOT how you let a Cleric role-play "Lawful Good." Even "Lawful Neutral" is pushing it. Don't let them say they're method-acting, or that it counts because they're following an interpretation of scripture.

This is NOT how you let a Cleric role-play "Lawful Good." Even "Lawful Neutral" is pushing it. Don't let them say they're method-acting, or that it counts because they're following an interpretation of scripture.

I can't tell whether that's obvious or just wrong because I don't know whether you're referring to the actions of the prisoner or the clergy.

way south:Zamboro: It's so tragically, pointlessly brutal. They have no concept of how meaningless it is to kill or die for either religion.

Its got nothing to do with religion.They just want you to think that way so you bang your head against our concept of freedom of religion instead of realizing its all about power and how they usurp it from the rightful authorities.

By making everyone a fearful member of faction X they allow a cleric three nations away to call the shots for people he couldn't give two craps about otherwise.Wont matter how many taliban we kill or how many times a day we drive through a town liberating people. This judge is putting the cold hard pinch of an outside power directly on them and its being perceived as having the blessing of the state.

Ifas long as we keep treating such men as religious leaders instead of enemy conspirators, we're not going to make any progress.

ciberido:"I agree, but my concern is that virtually any worldview (even atheism) can spawn that kind of fundamentalism. Have you ever visited a former Soviet republic, or country that was once a Soviet satellite? I have nothing against communism per se, but some of the atrocities that were done in the name of communism are just as bad as any honor killing or auto de fé."

I don't think Communism grew out of atheism. I think Communism grew out of Tsarist exploitation of Russian peasants. Atheism was integrated as a means of stripping the Russian Orthodox church of the considerable influence it held which posed a threat to the party.

Consider first that in all of history, you can find only one instance of atheists going along with mass murder, and they were by and large forced to be atheists by a regime installed to address social injustice.

By contrast, history is replete with endless examples of Christians, not of any other particular ideology, just plain ol' Christians, enacting mass murders.

redmid17:cyclebiff: "I was born in the United States, live in the United States, and pay taxes to the United States, but will NEVER pledge my allegiance to this retarded country." - Cyclebiff

To all you dirty xians out there, I don't doubt for a second that if fundies were in complete total control I would be killed for saying something like that. Same thing said for believing in your sky fairies.

So get off your high horses; brown people have their own respective rights to push their dying faith(s) on whomever they want.

2/10. You're trying WAY too hard.

I award you no points for being an asshole that contributed nothing to this thread beyond a ridiculous "troll" rating.

I'll clue you in, because when you do that, you're:

Not funny.Not clever.Not original.

/Yes, yes, nothing new under the sun//STFU///Don't take it personal, I just hate shiat like that

Zamboro:ciberido: "I agree, but my concern is that virtually any worldview (even atheism) can spawn that kind of fundamentalism. Have you ever visited a former Soviet republic, or country that was once a Soviet satellite? I have nothing against communism per se, but some of the atrocities that were done in the name of communism are just as bad as any honor killing or auto de fé."

I don't think Communism grew out of atheism. I think Communism grew out of Tsarist exploitation of Russian peasants. Atheism was integrated as a means of stripping the Russian Orthodox church of the considerable influence it held which posed a threat to the party.

Consider first that in all of history, you can find only one instance of atheists going along with mass murder, and they were by and large forced to be atheists by a regime installed to address social injustice.

By contrast, history is replete with endless examples of Christians, not of any other particular ideology, just plain ol' Christians, enacting mass murders.

What does this suggest?

It's also not honestly reflective of the atheist viewpoint if you worship the state instead of a supernatural god. Religion and jingoism are two sides of the same coin. The goal is to convince others to die on your behalf by asserting that greater ideals require their sacrifice. Christianity and Islam make this a particularly easy argument because your mark's core beliefs imply that life has no meaning beyond its function as a test for an eternal afterlife.

ciberido: And many who consider themselves reasonable act unreasonably.

Zamboro:In what sense? If you were to correct me like that I'd thank you for strengthening my understanding of reality.

By "many" I meant "many." It was not a comment on you in particular (nor any other individual, for that matter).

ciberido: But I'm not sure what your point is.

Zamboro:That there's an element of instability in even western, moderate believers because they have that soft, unprotected underbelly we sometimes poke even without meaning to.

Then I understand your point but disagree with it. People believe all kinds of ideas, few of which are totally rational. Just because you believe something that is not backed up by solid scientific evidence does not make you a ticking time-bomb. It just makes you potentially wrong.

But of course if you believe otherwise, surely you have solid scientific evidence backing up such a proposition? Extraordinary claims, Marcello Truzzi, yadda yadda.

Zamboro:When your identity and sense of meaning come from a set of beliefs that aren't tenable and that can be pointed out within the span of a sentence, it makes you an emotional landmine that can be set off with just those few words.

I suppose that would depend greatly on how exactly you define "tenable." I believe things which I will cheerfully admit are scientifically rather implausible. I've spent quite a lot of time thinking about them, discussing and debating them, refining and re-evaluating them, reading books which argue for or against them, contemplating how my life would be different if I stopped believing them, etc. I still have them (albeit modified over the years), so I guess by some standard one would have to admit that they are "tenable."

In all this time, I don't think I have ever been "set off" with "just those few words" which "can be pointed out within the span of a sentence." Believe you me, given some of the people I hang out with, if those magical trigger words you posit existed, then I would have heard them by now. And I don't know that I'm really all THAT exceptional, as religious people go.

Good thing Christians have never instigated mass murder for things like committing adultery, being a member of the wrong religion, living on property wanted by others. Or having the temerity to be an educated woman. Not in Europe, not in Massachusetts, nowhere.

abb3w:The problem is that if its done by a individuals perceived as outgroup, there will be a backlash against the outgroup by the entire society.

I'm not so sure. The general populace are also frozen by the knowledge these individuals are untouchable. It might give the illusion of more support than reality. These monsters destroy any schools that could advance people out of their grasp and replace them with a mutated version of the Koran. For the boys; the girls aren't even that lucky. Parents sent children to these schools, children wanted to go. That suggests less than a uniform agreement with those who shut them down.Unfortunately, for the allied forces a 'smart weapon' means only killing women and children within a defined radius. No wonder they hate the West. A sharper scalpel could be worth a try. You have to admit, it tempers the appeal for up and coming young bucks attracted by the lure of no-risk life and death power over their neighbors.

Frizbone:I shiat on Allah...Allah is shiatAllah is floating in my toilet right now.Soak bullets in the guts of a slaughtered pig before shooting the Muslims.I use the Koran as toilet paper.Muslims smell like BO.God Almighty will send Allah and his followers to Hell.

--------------------------------------------------------------------Uhh, you do realize that Muslims, Christians, and Jews all worship the same god, and that "Allah" is simply the Arabic word for "God", right? I mean really, please tell me that you are not that stupid.

ciberido:"Then I understand your point but disagree with it. People believe all kinds of ideas, few of which are totally rational. Just because you believe something that is not backed up by solid scientific evidence does not make you a ticking time-bomb. It just makes you potentially wrong."

Do you suppose all people have precisely equal ratios of rational to irrational beliefs? Do you suppose certain groups which value critical thought above religious faith might not have a ratio skewed in favor of rational beliefs?

ciberido:"But of course if you believe otherwise, surely you have solid scientific evidence backing up such a proposition? Extraordinary claims, Marcello Truzzi, yadda yadda."

Well, I actually do have a huge list of studies, but they all demonstrate greater intelligence among atheists, and we both know intelligence and rationality are different things. I suspect if similar studies set out to make that determination they would find atheists more rational as well, but I can't assert that as true just yet. I can only ask what you honestly suppose the outcome of those tests would reveal.

ciberido:"I suppose that would depend greatly on how exactly you define "tenable."

If you have to ask this to begin with, it should raise a few red flags in your mind. A sort of "That depends on what the meaning of 'is' is" moment.

ciberido:"I believe things which I will cheerfully admit are scientifically rather implausible. I've spent quite a lot of time thinking about them, discussing and debating them, refining and re-evaluating them, reading books which argue for or against them, contemplating how my life would be different if I stopped believing them, etc. I still have them (albeit modified over the years), so I guess by some standard one would have to admit that they are "tenable."

You don't suppose the fact that you were raised with those beliefs has anything to do with it? That it might have produced a bias that would make you especially sympathetic to religious arguments, giving them the benefit of the doubt even where they're particularly weak while being hypercritical of arguments against?

ciberido:"In all this time, I don't think I have ever been "set off" with "just those few words" which "can be pointed out within the span of a sentence." Believe you me, given some of the people I hang out with, if those magical trigger words you posit existed, then I would have heard them by now. And I don't know that I'm really all THAT exceptional, as religious people go."

I've heard this before, and I asked in the first place because a week or two ago I saw a discussion similar to the one in the image I posted on a friend's facebook. In this case it was concerning global warming. I understood him to be of the view that it is a scientific conspiracy and he has Biblical reasons for doubting that the Earth's climate could change significantly. The topic image was a political cartoon depicting midwestern climatology advocates coated in thick snow, as if to mock the idea that the recent monster storms could be in any way related to an overall elevation in temperature. I posted only "Access to warm air increases the potential moisture available to a snowstorm and can increase snowfall in regions where winter storms regularly occur anyway".

What I got back was a multi page furious message in my inbox which, at the end, threatened to terminate our friendship. This man is normally the sweetest you could hope to meet and considers himself a model Christian. In a lot of ways he is, but he still has that red button anyone could bump into.

Zamboro:I don't think Communism grew out of atheism. I think Communism grew out of Tsarist exploitation of Russian peasants. Atheism was integrated as a means of stripping the Russian Orthodox church of the considerable influence it held which posed a threat to the party.

Are you kidding me? I never suggested that communism was a product of atheism or vice-versa. The early Christian church was communist. Some liberal Christians would argue that Christianity itself is, or should be, intrinsically communist. This has nothing to do with any relationship between atheism and communism, if there even IS one.

All I'm saying is that EVERY ideology --- communism, Islam, Christianity, capitalism, atheism, antidisestablishmentarianism, what-have-you --- can give rise to a fundamentalist strain which leads its adherents to act in intolerant, hostile, and violent ways.

Zamboro:Consider first that in all of history, you can find only one instance of atheists going along with mass murder, and they were by and large forced to be atheists by a regime installed to address social injustice.

I've gone down this road before in other Fark religion threads (and there have been a lot of Fark religion threads), and it always gets into arguments about whether or not we should count atheists who just happened to be atheists as opposed to atheists who committed atrocities in the NAME of atheism. (And someone will dispute that that EVER happened, then people will argue about what exactly it means to "do X in the name of Y.") Eventually someone will claim that Hitler was an atheist, someone else will say no, Hitler was a Christian, and then it's a race between which gets cited first, Godwin's law or the "No True Scotsman" fallacy.

Zamboro:By contrast, history is replete with endless examples of Christians, not of any other particular ideology, just plain ol' Christians, enacting mass murders.

I really have no idea where you're going with this "just plain ol' Christians" thing. Were you anticipating my next argument to be "Sure, those damn Catholics are a right nasty piece of work, but we Methodists are just dandy!"?

History is replete with endless examples of people, not of any particular ideology, just plain ol' people, enacting mass murders. What do we make of that?

What it suggests to me is that people were evil before Christianity existed, that evil didn't take a vacation afterward, and that people will continue to be evil long after Christianity and every other religion have become extinct (if indeed such a thing should ever come to pass, which I highly doubt).

It's ludicrously naïve to propose that abolishing religion would solve all of our problems. It's like saying that racism and bigotry would end if a magic spell caused everyone on Earth to have the exact same skin tone. Five minutes on, the attached-earlobe peoples of the world would declare war on the unattached-earlobe people, and the big noses would enslave the button-nosed folks, or at least force them to drink from separate water fountains.

Take away religion, and we've still got race to fight over. Take away race and we've still got language, then politics, music, gender, food --- next thing you know, we're fighting World World VI over whether the toilet paper goes over or under the roll.

The most one could argue without being completely ridiculous is that getting rid of religion might help a little bit. And even that claim seems pretty dubious to me, but I'm at least willing to entertain the notion if that's what you really want to say.

And, of course, all of this assumes that no religion of the world could possibly be, you know, true. See, I'm just handing you as a freebie, "Sure, let's say my religion is bullshiat and go from there." It won't get you as far as you might expect.

If Allah were really as powerful as they believe Allah to be, then Allah is capable of punishing "infidels" himself and doesn't need followers to do it for him. By doing Allah's judging for him, Allah's followers are actually insulting Allah. It's like saying "We don't think you're capable of taking care of the problem yourself"

ciberido:"Are you kidding me? I never suggested that communism was a product of atheism or vice-versa. The early Christian church was communist. Some liberal Christians would argue that Christianity itself is, or should be, intrinsically communist. This has nothing to do with any relationship between atheism and communism, if there even IS one."

When you said "but my concern is that virtually any worldview (even atheism) can spawn that kind of fundamentalism." I interpreted "spawn" to mean "grow out of". If I was mistaken in doing so I apologize.

ciberido:"All I'm saying is that EVERY ideology --- communism, Islam, Christianity, capitalism, atheism, antidisestablishmentarianism, what-have-you --- can give rise to a fundamentalist strain which leads its adherents to act in intolerant, hostile, and violent ways."

I agree, I just don't think Communism is accurately described as fundamentalist atheism, whatever that would entail. I don't think we've seen such a thing yet, and like you, I hope we never do.

When Secular Coalition for America starts issuing uniforms and guns, I'll gladly concede the point and take up arms against them.

ciberido:"I've gone down this road before in other Fark religion threads (and there have been a lot of Fark religion threads), and it always gets into arguments about whether or not we should count atheists who just happened to be atheists as opposed to atheists who committed atrocities in the NAME of atheism. (And someone will dispute that that EVER happened, then people will argue about what exactly it means to "do X in the name of Y.") Eventually someone will claim that Hitler was an atheist, someone else will say no, Hitler was a Christian, and then it's a race between which gets cited first, Godwin's law or the "No True Scotsman" fallacy."

Yes, I've been through the same argument myself many times. But I am not saying any of those things. I have what I believe are novel arguments. I've put a lot of thought into them and would like to explore them with you, if you're interested, without them being casually dismissed.

ciberido:"I really have no idea where you're going with this "just plain ol' Christians" thing. Were you anticipating my next argument to be "Sure, those damn Catholics are a right nasty piece of work, but we Methodists are just dandy!"?

History is replete with endless examples of people, not of any particular ideology, just plain ol' people, enacting mass murders. What do we make of that?"

What do I make of it? It's a deliberate oversimplification. You've removed ideologies from consideration entirely because there are certain ones which have been dramatically, drastically more violent throughout history. Widening it to include all of humankind ignores the disproportionate distribution of atrocities, and I believe it's motivated by a desire to defend the image of religion and particularly Christian religion in spite of the valid charges against it.

ciberido:"What it suggests to me is that people were evil before Christianity existed, that evil didn't take a vacation afterward, and that people will continue to be evil long after Christianity and every other religion have become extinct (if indeed such a thing should ever come to pass, which I highly doubt)."

All true, but it's a deliberate oversimplification. Abrahamic religions have committed the lion's share of religious violence throughout the ages. It's fair to speculate as to why this might be so and differ with me in opinion, but the central fact, that the Abrahamic religions are disproportionately violent compared to the rest, is simply historical fact.

ciberido:"It's ludicrously naïve to propose that abolishing religion would solve all of our problems. It's like saying that racism and bigotry would end if a magic spell caused everyone on Earth to have the exact same skin tone. Five minutes on, the attached-earlobe peoples of the world would declare war on the unattached-earlobe people, and the big noses would enslave the button-nosed folks, or at least force them to drink from separate water fountains."

I agree. I've never suggested abolishing religion and would find that sort of imposition unacceptable. I could hardly consider myself a free thinker if I didn't.

But you bring up racism, and I'm glad you did; It's true that racism cannot be abolished, and yet we've done as much as we can; We've forbidden it in government and in private companies, in schools and even in churches. We've done this not with the expectation that it will turn the world into a post-racial utopia overnight but because it's a baby step in the right direction. That's how things improve.

ciberido:"Take away religion, and we've still got race to fight over. Take away race and we've still got language, then politics, music, gender, food --- next thing you know, we're fighting World World VI over whether the toilet paper goes over or under the roll."

Hahaha, see, and this is more absurd even than blaming all violence on religion. People are not all that bad. Don't mistake cynicism for realism. You manage not to club your neighbor or coworker to death when he or she annoys you, how do you manage that? Can we not aspire to reproduce the pragmatic, working tolerance between the two of you on a larger scale? What is it that makes it possible for neighbors to coexist without violence, but not neighboring countries?

ciberido:"The most one could argue without being completely ridiculous is that getting rid of religion might help a little bit. And even that claim seems pretty dubious to me, but I'm at least willing to entertain the notion if that's what you really want to say."

More or less, but I am emphatically not suggesting we abolish it. Can't be done, and the attempt would be worse than anything religion has ever caused. I think even nudging religion into the margins and coaching it to do away with the "faith is virtuous" spiel would be plenty, and there are gentler ways to do that than pitchforks and torches.

ciberido:"And, of course, all of this assumes that no religion of the world could possibly be, you know, true. See, I'm just handing you as a freebie, "Sure, let's say my religion is bullshiat and go from there." It won't get you as far as you might expect."

Yeah at least our ancestors only burned witches at the stake. I wonder if the Muslims in the middle east had a half decent public education system and opportunities to express themselves via any means other than religion, if they might catch up to our fundies and just be hypocrites over family values at election time?